legal sanity
can massages and candied apples cure lawyer attrition?
The other night, my kids turned on one of the made-for-T.V. movies that abound this time of year. It featured siblings who live in a beautiful home filled with all the latest toys and gadgets. Despite the material bounty around them, these T.V. sisters were enormously unhappy because they lived with a disinterested dad and an ogress of a step-mom.
On the one hand, this was a predictable and contrived storyline. On the other hand, it carried an important message: it's the people, and not the things, around us that usually determine our longer-term happiness and fulfillment.
This was the message underlying a post I wrote on toxic law firms. It also runs through this Be Excellent synopsis of a Gallup survey that explored how the employee-manager relationship affects employee engagement.
This same message came to mind when I read a recent New York Times article titled: For Lawyers, Perks to Fit a Lifestyle (also vetted by Gerry Riskin at Amazing Firms, Amazing Practices). Noting that associates are “routinely jumping ship to go elsewhere,” the piece describes the material perks some firms are offering to “create a workplace that caters to their young recruits’ wants and needs, while freeing them to bill 60 hours or more a week.”
Among the perks cited are:
- Milkshakes
- Extended Sabbaticals
- Mortgage Assistance
- Wine Tastings
- Yoga Classes
- Nap Rooms
- Nanny Services
http://www.legalsanity.com/admin/trackback/52341
Wow. Excellent post. I couldn't agree more. I posted on the NY Times article recently (HERE). It is ridiculous. Good on ya. I wish more law students read your blog and understood the ramifications. Keep it up!
TriLawyer
Contract attorneys, who have picked up a large portion of the rote document review that associates used to do, fall well short of having access to any of these additional perks. Contract attorneys find it difficult to find access even to basic healthcare or Employee Assistance Programs.
If Associates receive little acknowledgement from Partners, I can tell you that it is much worse for contract attorneys, who often work elbow-to-elbow in mentally and physically unhealthy, windowless offices, in the same large firms as associates who have access to yoga classes, free milkshakes, and mortgage assistance.
I recently took a survey of contract attorneys on my blog, JDWired, which was completed over the Thanksgiving weekend, by 117 contract attorneys who have worked on at least one temporary legal project over the past year. 36% of the survey respondents reported that they "never" had access an HMO through their staffing agencies over the past year. 32% said "Sometimes." Fewer still reported having access to a PPO: 44% said "Never," while 32% said "Sometimes." 53% said that they "Never" had access to Vision insurance.
But contract work has been the primary source of income for at least six months for 54% of the contract attorneys surveyed. Therefore, temporary work is becoming a long-term solution for many lawyers.
I do not begrudge associates of any of these things. I do not deny that law firms are having a difficult time retaining associates. But the problem of attrition may be the nature of the work itself. And there are thousands of contract lawyers who are happy with $35 per hour, with no benefits. These people are not jumping ship so easily--and the only sabbaticlas they receive are those which are thrust upon them--when a project ends and they are out of work for six weeks.